Crocker primed to attack with rally title in his sights

Subaru star Cody Crocker can all but wrap up the Australian rally championship if he can pilot his Impreza WRX to victory in the forests of the Yarra Valley in the Rally of Melbourne this weekend.

But veteran Mitsubishi driver Ed Ordynski, a multiple title winner, will be waiting to take advantage of any Crocker slip-ups and stake his own claim for the championship in the three-day event, which includes more than 200 kilometres of competitive stages in the rural area close to north-eastern Melbourne.

Since joining the Subaru Rally Team Australia in 1998 as understudy to the late New Zealand champion Possum Bourne, Victorian Crocker has won group N (showroom production cars) at the Rally of Melbourne four times. He took outright honours in 1999 and last year was runner-up overall to teammate Bourne, the rallying legend who was killed earlier this year.

Crocker will again start in his older MY02 Impreza, the car that he and co-driver Greg Foletta have steered to victory in five of this year's eight heats as well as to second place in group N at Rally New Zealand against world championship rivals.

He sits on top of the standings on 134 points, 19 ahead of Ordynski. Another Subaru driver, Simon Evans, is third on 91 points with yet another Subaru man, Crocker's teammate Dean Herridge, fourth on 80 points.

Crocker describes his hometown event as his favourite and yesterday pledged to take the battle to his rivals from flagfall.

"We always start these events confident of producing good results. We reckon that if we have a good clean run each day we are a big show to take the maximum points," he said.

"It would have been good to have the MY03 car as it has some advantages, but we have the MY02 Impreza back running as we'd like it to.

"We had a different set-up in South Australia, where we reverted to a dogbox gearbox, for example. But now we've gone back to the flywire, which was what we were running when we dominated in those first three events of the championship.

"We were probably a bit conservative in South Australia but we'll go out and attack from the very first stage in Melbourne.

"The roads suit us; they flow really nicely and yet they require enormous commitment. We are always comfortable with that."

Team Mitsubishi Ralliart's Ordynski and co-driver Iain Stewart go into this event chasing a hat-trick of Australian rally championship super series wins, but are well aware that it is the home ground of many of their rivals, such as Crocker, Evans, Mitsubishi's Spencer Lowndes and Scott Pedder.

"These guys cut their teeth on these roads. They've got a lot to play for and will be going all-out," Ordynski said.

The South Australian and his Queensland co-driver will be competing in a rebuilt Evolution VII Mitsubishi Lancer after a freak rollover put them out of Rally Australia while leading the group N category of that world championship event in Western Australia early this month.

He forecasts that victory in Melbourne will be much tougher than the NSW and South Australian rounds that he and Stewart won in July and August.

"They're (his key rivals) in four of the quickest cars in the series. All have points to prove and will see Melbourne as a big opportunity to win a round," Ordynski said.

Another eyeing a podium place is former rally champion Neal Bates in the event that will mark the first anniversary of Toyota's return to the ARC.